GENETEKA POLAND DATABASE - PODKARPAKIE
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When you're on a budget, or just plain broke, you may not be able to buy spices or food flavorings or the basic vanilla that is used in most recipes for cookies and baked goods.
However, you can nicely flavor a basic healthy cookie by using the zest and juice of an orange or lemon. You can use very little sugar in a recipe and depend on raisins - or other dried fruits to add the sweet. Looking over standard recipes for most cookies, there really is a whole lot of sugar being used - too much.
Maybe you picked up free sugar packets when you had coffee out? *** At the bottom of this recipe there is yet another way to substitute for sugar.
Food Banks give out a lot of oatmeal. Oatmeal as cereal is healthy for you because oats are supposed to lower cholesterol. The oatmeal comes in bags, boxes, and as instant cereals. It's rather bland by itself.
These cookies are closer to a "health bar" than the usual cookie and have a lower guilt factor if you eat a few at a time! They also provide fiber to your diet.
Oven temperature 375 degrees. Time to bake depends on how large you scoop the cookie. A cookie lump using about a fourth cup of batter takes 20 to 30 minutes. Baking sheets do not need to be buttered or oiled but the bottoms of these cookies will be browned so lightly greasing them won't hurt. Since ovens have variations just watch the first batch you make and take notes. These cookies will not spread out, so you can fit a lot of them on one sheet. The baked cookie is not hard, but dry, but for the sweet fruit. The crunch comes from the nuts. You may not notice the oatmeal at all!
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Wet Bowl Ingredients:
One egg.
1/3 cup liquid oil. (soybean or vegetable OK)
1/2 cup water (plus more set aside to be added gradually, as needed.)
1/3 cup sugar - brown best - or less.***
The juice of one lemon. Or the juice of one half orange. Before squeezing make zest from outer skin of the lemon or orange and add to this mixture. I use the whole lemon peel or half orange peel.
Wisk these in a separate bowl gently to blend.
Dry Bowl Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup wheat flour
3/4 cup dry oatmeal (instant is fine)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder (not soda)
Any dry spices you wish to add such as pumpkin, allspice, or cinnamon, instead of the lemon or orange juice and zest. Use one teaspoon or less.
Stir around with a fork to blend these dry ingredients well.
Fruit and Nut Bowl
Half a cup of raisins, small cut figs, cranberries, or as you like.
Three fourths cup of nuts such as peanuts, almonds, walnuts. Coconut flakes can be used.
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NO OIL?
Substitute in 1/4 up peanut butter or 1/4 cup mashed banana (blackened best).
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Turn the oven on to preheat.
Gently pour the wet mixture into the dry and, using a fork. Add extra water bit by bit as needed. You want a thick mixture, not too gooey or runny. Once you are satisfied that there is no dry flour - oatmeal remaining, fold in the nuts and raisins. Scoop out on baking sheets... Do this by hand. It only takes a minute, if that.
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With this basic recipe, whatever you got at the food bank will work, just vary it as you want.
Some suggestions include peanut butter and walnut with raisins, almonds with banana and raisins using lemon zest and juice, orange and raisin or orange and cranberry - whatever combo you come up with.
SUGAR SUBSTITUTES:
Now, if you are low on sugar you can also add one flavored packet of instant oatmeal. For instance the MAPLE flavoring usually also has a lot of sugar in the packet, enough to flavor the whole recipe. The APPLE flavored instant oatmeal may be nice with some cut up apples and you can use apple sauce instead of oil.
You may also use 1/4 cup of jam or jelly instead of sugar. Wisk it in with the Wet ingredients.
Be creative!
I made a batch of these cookies for a picky friend who usually takes one of those store bought healthy bars with him on the road and he loved them. Two or three of these with tea can be breakfast.
C 2023 Magyar- American - BlogSpot
LENTILS PROVIDE protein as well as having other outstanding attributes.
LENTIL SOUP
Here's a Lentil don't:
There are different colors and types of lentils. When boiling or using for soup, don't mix the types together as they need different cooking times. If you have regular lentils (the pale brown-green type) and say, red lentils, you will need to cook them separately and put them in the soup at the end of the cooking time. In general lentils usually do not need long cooking times like dry beans and, as they break down a bit, they will thicken the soup. Lentils can also overcook and turn into mush quickly. However, the cooking lends a bit of flavor to the broth. Don't use the little round black lentils for this recipe which are sometimes called "French lentils." Those are much better as an add-in to a rice dish. The green-brown lentils should simmer to cook in about 25 to 35 minutes.
Broth. I haven't seen broth given out too often in food distribution bags, so you will probably have to provide your own. Some bullion products are mostly salt, even contain the salty food preservative MSG (which I'm wary of) but if you do not have the time to cook up a broth using veggies or chicken, you can use the packets that come with those dry noodle soup packages as your broth base! I believe a major brand brags that there is no MSG in there. (Use the dry noodle for another recipe!)
One way to flavor a broth, is to make "stock." You to throw in the parts of the veggies you didn't want to eat in the water, such as carrots and stems, and boil to simmer them. Remove them from the broth before including the veggies you do want in the soup. You may also throw in bones recently saved from another meal.
For about a gallon of broth, use about two cups of lentils unless you want a very thick type soup.
Tradition is that carrots go into the broth as well as a BAY LEAF (Greek Laurel) and onions. They say Bay leaves add SOUL. But you are being adventurous as well as thrifty so we have to think about what we have in the garden or on hand.
Skillet cooking veggies and spices first:
Cut up whatever veggies you have into smallish pieces including kale, celery, cabbage, onions, garlic, carrots, and cook them first in a pan till semi soft, with some olive or coconut oil... garlic first, onions next, then the celery, just a minute or two between, overall about ten minutes over low heat. Kale is called a nutrition superstar packed with vitamins and minerals. Cabbage has vitamin C, more than citrus. So do peppers. Then mix all these veggies in your broth. Tradition is to use the celery ribs. I use leaves and all. (Leaves that are going yellow should be plucked.)
This pan is also where to put spices that need the cooking to release their powers. For an East Indian flavor consider adding cumin, curry powder, or even the masala type spices that are sold in small boxes. Of course your favorite paprika can please. One teaspoon or less is usually enough to spice up a gallon of soup for European tastes.
You can also use cilantro as a garnish or include it or parsley into your soup.
If you use canned vegetables, they are already cooked, so add them and the juice in the can at the end of the cooking, so they don't turn into tasteless and limp veggies.
You can also use rice (about one third cup dry is about one cup cooked) or potato. Rice can be white or brown and I suggest that, while it will cook in broth, timing is important, as it will do so in about ten to twenty minutes. So I cook rice separately. rinse it, and put it in the soup towards the end of the cooking. By putting the rice on the side, some of your family may decide they want the soup without it. Both are starches and I think should be added towards the end of the cooking.
Now, some people cook the lentils on the side, then put half in a blender, so adding two different lentil textures to the broth. If you have no broth, you can easily make a lentil-rich dish that will go over rice or potato instead.
C 2023 Magyar-American BlogSpot